Dallas Lauderdale, his sister Tahja, left, and dad Dallas II, right, have made the sacrifices necessary to help his mom, Carol, deal with her disease.

Sacrifice part of Buckeye's being -

Most kids grow up wanting to be the star. The quarterback. The leading scorer. The home run
hitter.

The value of playing a role for the good of a team doesn't sink in until later, usually by
necessity.

Dallas Lauderdale began playing his role early, by necessity, in an arena more obscure and very
much more real than the one in which he plays now.

"When I started playing my role, I was in high school," said Lauderdale, a 6-foot-8 sophomore
for Ohio State. "I had to start coming home during my lunch break and get my mom lunch or do things
for her that she wasn't able to do. I was just there for her. She's my mom. She's my heart.

"It's just like basketball -- everything is a team effort. My mom has her affliction, but me, my
sister (Tahja) and my dad have got to work as a team."

Lauderdale's mother, Carol, has multiple sclerosis. She has had the disease since Dallas was in
grade school.

"She was diagnosed with symptoms in 1996," said Lauderdale's father, Dallas II, "but nothing
really changed until probably a year, year and a half later, when she had to retire from her job
(as a credit manager at a manufacturing company) and take on a different lifestyle.

"We had to be a little more giving at that point with respect to our time. As her situation
became worse, it just required each of us to do a little more and to sacrifice a little more.

"Everybody chipped in. Dallas was the one, as her physical condition got worse and he was still
in high school (Tahja was away at college), who could run home at lunchtime and during emergencies
to kind of see about her, and that was very helpful."

Carol Lauderdale uses a wheelchair almost all of the time now. She can stand sometimes, her son
said, "but not for long." She can talk and use her hands, he said, but her left is weaker than her
right.

With Dallas and Tahja living in Columbus -- Tahja works at Riverside Methodist Hospital -- and
Dallas II a facilities manager for NASA in Cleveland and pastor of Trinity Christian Church in
suburban Solon, Carol is assisted for most of the day by home health-care professionals.

"She just lives every day as it comes," her son said. "She knows that God has everything in
control and everything happens for a reason. Her faith is really strong with what's going on."

Carol's condition prevents her from attending most Ohio State home games because they start too
early or too late. But with the family celebrating Christmas at Tahja's home two weeks ago, Carol
was in Value City Arena for the Dec. 27 game against West Virginia.

Dallas said he talks to her every day by phone.

"I love my mom," he said. "I love my dad equally as much, but I guess because I'm such a mama's
boy. People always tell me that when I was young, during the holidays when everybody was around, I
used to always crawl to my mom when I couldn't walk, to just be around my mom."

In high school, Dallas said he willingly gave up time with his friends to spend it with his
mother.

"We liked to play Uno," Carol said.

Dallas II said that his son wasn't necessarily home all the time, but that family time was
important to him.

"Some kids, Friday comes along and they want to go to the party after the game. It was not a
priority for him. Not that he didn't do it, but it was not the most important thing to do.

"He liked hanging around the house, being with his mother, playing games and doing silly things
together. Dallas can get my wife to do things that I cannot. She's putty in his hands."

Dallas II's father and grandfather were Baptist preachers. Some say that Dallas III, who sings
in the church choir when he's home, will be the fourth generation to heed the call, but "I don't
see it," he said.

"I don't know what plans God has in store for Dallas," his father said. "I will tell you that
Dallas has always been more spiritually minded at a younger age than I was.

"In the third or fourth grade, when a teacher's husband passed away, she called and told me
Dallas was the one kid in class who came up to her and told her he was sorry and was going to pray
for her. He's always had a caring, benevolent spirit. Even (in high school), when he didn't come
home for lunch, he spent time with the kids in the special education area. It was a thrill for them
to have their hero come by.

"He's a good kid. He has a good heart. I just wish no, I'm not going to say that."

Say what?

"You see some athletes, they're in your face, 'I'm the best. I'm going to whip your (rear).' In
some cases, it takes that attitude to achieve success in sports," Dallas II said.

"Dallas is not like that. I was going to say that I wish he had more of that. But I don't."

Ohio State coaches might wish Lauderdale did have more of that. But his is a personality that
has been shaped by more in his young life than just the bounce of a ball and the score of a
game.

"Basketball is a sport," Dallas II said, "and it's a pretty important aspect of his life right
now. But it's not all-encompassing."